Taggers avoid jail time for defacing New Bedford buildings

Thursday

Feb 21, 2013 at 12:01 AMFeb 21, 2013 at 1:50 PM

NEW BEDFORD — Two Rhode Island men who went on a spree tagging historic and downtown buildings with graffiti in October 2011 will have to do community service and make restitution, but won't serve any jail time.

CURT BROWN

NEW BEDFORD — Two Rhode Island men who went on a spree tagging historic and downtown buildings with graffiti in October 2011 will have to do community service and make restitution, but won't serve any jail time.

Judge Beverly Cannone ordered Reddick Vaughn, 25, and Shawn Marrow, 35, both of Providence, to pay $3,900 combined in restitution, perform hundreds of hours of community service in New Bedford and serve three years' probation, after they pleaded guilty in New Bedford District Court Wednesday to 11 counts of tagging.

The judge ordered Vaughn to perform 400 hours of community service and Marrow, 500 hours.

Gregg Miliote, a spokesman for the Bristol County District Attorney's office, said Vaughn and Marrow must perform at least one day per week of community service in New Bedford until they have completed their sentences. Each will also lose his driver's license for a year.

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Cannone gave no explanation for her decision not to impose any jail time. Prosecutor Caleb Weiner recommended the pair receive a sentence of two years in the Bristol County House of Correction with a year to be served and the balance suspended. The prosecutor also requested 500 hours of community service as well as restitution.

In April of last year, Marrow and Vaughn entered guilty pleas in the tagging case, only to withdraw them minutes later when they learned Judge Peter J. Kilmartin was ordering Marrow to serve four months and Vaughn to serve three months in jail.

Both men declined to speak with The Standard-Times on Wednesday after they were sentenced. Kathryn Blythe, the attorney for Marrow, also declined comment, and Edward Molari, Vaughn's attorney, could not be reached for comment.

A third defendant, Kyle Pollock, 27, of Lincoln, R.I., is scheduled to go to trial on April 30 in New Bedford District Court.

The three men were charged in the Oct. 15, 2011, defacement of at least 11 downtown properties, including the historic Seamen's Bethel, the Custom House and the Zeiterion Performing Arts Center.

Mayor Jon Mitchell spoke prior to sentencing and urged the judge to commit the defendants to a year in jail. The properties they vandalized are "near and dear to the city's heart," and their actions were done in "a calculated and deliberate way," he said.

"This is no run-of-the-mill graffiti case," he said, adding the defendants are "grown men" who sought "to do harm to the city itself."

Mitchell said he was disappointed with the lack of any jail time and said it would have served as a deterrent to others who commit vandalism.

The mayor also said Vaughn and Marrow will face hard work when they return to New Bedford for their community service.

"We'll make sure they are put to work and if that means they will have to break out a toothbrush and scrub graffiti off walls, then that is what they will have to do," he said.

District Attorney C. Samuel Sutter also criticized the failure to impose jail time.

"That is the only sentence that would have sent the message that needed to be sent about the sanctity of our historic buildings in New Bedford, Fall River, Taunton and Attleboro," he said in a statement.

Sutter said he wishes the sentencing had been before a judge "who had either lived or worked in this area for a long period of time.

"That is the way it used to be but it is no longer," he said. "Community judges for community courts. "Somehow we have gotten away from this concept and we need to get back to it. It makes a difference."

Former Mayor Scott W. Lang, who was the city's chief executive at the time of the incident, was also disappointed by the lack of jail time.

The defendants' actions were "premeditated" and this was not "a case of boys having fun," he said. They came to New Bedford with the intention of "vandalizing and marking our private properties," he said.

"It was malicious destruction of historic and personal property and they should have received jail time," he said.

The community service could have been performed while they were incarcerated, he said. "They should be thinking about their community service as they spend each night in jail," he said.

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